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OFFICIAL noMA-riON- 




WILLIAM FRANCIS BARTLETT 



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A RECORD 



DEDICATION OF THE STATUE 

OF 

MAJOR GENERAL 

WILLIAM FRANCIS BARTLETT 

A TRIBUTE OF THE COMMONWEALTH OF MASSACHUSETTS 
May - 27 - 1904 




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BOSTON: PRINTED BY ORDER OF THE GOVERNOR AND 
COUNCIL : WRIGHT AND POTTER PRINTING COMPANY 
STATE PRINTERS : : : NINETEEN HUNDRED AND FIVE 



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MAY 10 .i;0f5 



*--. . ; .i::.. 



Resolves of the General Court 6 

Orders of the Governor's Council 10 

Introduction ] ^ 

Biography 25 

Programme 33 

Address by His Honor Curtis Guild, Jr., Lieutenant Governor 37 

Address by His EJccellency John L. Bates, Governor 41 

Prayer by Rt. Rev. William Lawrence, D.D. 47 

Oration by Brigadier General Morris Schaff 51 

Epistolary tribute by Captain W. Gordon McCabe 75 

Epistolctfy tribute by Captain John S. Wise 81 




RESOLVES 

OF THE GENERAL COURT 



DEDICATION OF BARTLETT STATUE 



Commonwealth of Massachusetts 

IN THE YEAR ONE THOUSAND NINE HUNDRED AND ONE 

RESOLVE 

[CHAPTER FIFTY-FIVE] 

TO PROVIDE FOR EFFECTING UPON THE STATE 
HOUSE GROUNDS A STATUE OF THE LATE 
MAJOR GENERAL WILLIAM FRANCIS BARTLETT 

RESOLVED, that there be allowed and paid out of the treasury of the 
Commonwealth, to be expended under the direction of the governor emd 
council, a sum not exceeding twenty thousand dollars, for the purpose of erect- 
ing in Massachusetts a statue in bronze of the late Major General William 
Francis Bartlett, said statue to be placed upon the state house grounds on such 
site as the governor and council may designate. 

House of Representatives, April 10, 1901 

Passed. JAMES J. MYERS, 

Speaker 

In Senate, April 15, 1901 

Passed. RUFUS A. SOULE, 

President 

April 16, 1901 
Approved. W. MURRAY CRANE 

Office of the Secretary, Boston, Sept. 23, 1904 
A true copy. 

Witness the Great Seal of the Commonwealth, 

WILLIAM M. OLIN, 

Secretary oj the Commonwealth 



DEDICATION OF BARTLETT STATUE 



Commonwealth of Massachusetts 

IN THE YEAR ONE THOUSAND NINE HUNDRED AND THREE 

RE50LVE 

[CHAPTER FOUR] 

RELATIVE TO THE SITE OF THE STATUE OF 
THE LATE MAJOR GENERAL WILUAM FRANCIS 
BARTLETT 

RESOLVED, that the statue of the late Major General William Francis 
Bartlett, provided for by chapter fifty-five of the resolves of the year nine- 
teen hundred and one, and now in course of construction, may be placed either 
within the state house or in the state house grounds, as the governor and 
council shall decide, and at a point which shall be designated by the governor 
and council. 

House of Representatives, Feb. 5, 1903 
Passed. JAMES J. MYEFIS. 

Speaker 

In Senate, Feb. 6, 1903 
Passed. GEORGE R. JONES, 

President 

Feb. 6. 1903 
Approved. JOHN L. BATES 

Office of the Secretary, Boston, Sept. 23, 1904 
A true copy. 

Witness the Great Seal of the Commonwealth, 

WILLIAM M. OLIN, 

Secretary of the Commonwealth 



ORDERS 

OF THE GOVERNOR'S COUNCIL 



DEDICATION OF BARTLETT STATUE 



Commonwealth of Massachusetts 



COUNCIL CHAMBER 



Boston. Jan. 15. 1902 
/^^RDEIRED. that Daniel C. French be invited to submit to the governor 
and council a proposition in writing, for the erection, on the state house 
grounds, of a statue in bronze of the late Major General William Francis 
Bartlett; the completion of the same, including the pedestal and the time within 
which the work shall be completed to be stated in the proposition. 



Adopted in council. Jan. 15. 1902. 



EDWARD F. HAMLIN. 

Executive Secretary 



10 



DEDICATION OF BARTLETT STATUE 



Commonwealth of Massachusetts 



COUNCIL CHAMBER 



Boston, Jan. 29, 1902 

^"NRDERED, that the executive secretary be authorized on behalf of the 
governor and council to sign the contract with Daniel Chester French, 
for a statue to be cast in bronze of General WilUam Francis Bartlett, said 
contract bemg dated Jan. 29, 1902. 



Adopted m council, Jan. 29, 1904. 



EDWARD F. HAMUN, 

Executive Secretary 



11 



DEDICATION OF BARTLETT STATUE 



Commonwealth ef Massachusetts 



COUNCIL CHAMBER 



Boston, April 29. 1903 

/* \RDE1RED, that the statue of the late Major General William Francis 
Bartlett, provided for by chapter fifty-five of the resolves of the year 
nineteen hundred emd one, be placed in one of the niches in the memorial hall 
in the state house, as authorized by chapter four of the resolves of the year 
nineteen hundred and three. 
A true copy. 

Attest: 

EDWARD F. HAMLIN, 

Executive Secretary 



12 



DEDICATION OF BARTLETT STATUE 



Commonwealth of Massachusetts 



COUNCIL CHAMBER 



Boston. Sept. 28, 1904 

/^RDEIRED, that Francis Hurtubis, Jr., private secretary to His Elxcellency 
the Governor, be authorized to edit and publish a report of the proceed- 
ings incident to the erection, unveiling and dedication of the statue of Major 
General William Francis Bartlett. The expense attending the same to be paid 
out of the appropriation authorized by the provisions of chapter fifty- five of the 
resolves of the year nineteen hundred and one, and chapter four of the resolves 
of the year nineteen hundred and three. 
Adopted in council, Sept. 28, 1904. 

EDWARD F. HAMLIN, 

Executive Secretary 



13 



INTRODUCTION 



^ 



^ 



N the forty-first anniversary of the battle of 
Port Hudson, May 27, 1904, there was 
unveiled in Memorial Hall, in the State 



House, in Boston, a statue in bronze of Major General 
William Francis Bartlett. 

The ceremonies w^ere brief but impressive. In the 
beautiful circular hall of Sienna marble, its balcony rail 
draped with heavy festoons of laurel, and with glories 
of flags above each portal, with its scores of tattered 
battle-Hags silently proclaiming the noble patriotism dis- 
played in the struggle for the Union, and its splendid 
mural paintings of events conspicuous in the history of 
Massachusetts, there was gathered a large assemblage in- 
cluding the first representatives of every walk of life 
in the Commonwealth, official, military, professional and 
business. 

Colonel Charles Shaler was specially detailed by the 
Secretary of War to represent the United States Army 
at the dedication. 

There were present also survivors of the three Massa- 
chusetts regiments in which General Bartlett served, the 

17 



DEDICATION OF BARTLETT STATUE 

Twentieth, Forty-ninth and Fifty-seventh, twenty members 
of General Bartlett's class. Harvard, 1862, and members 
of the Women's Relief Corps. 

Mrs. William Francis Bartlett was accompanied by 
her son, Edwin B. Bartlett, and by her daughters and 
grandchildren. Her party included Miss Edith Bartlett, 
Pittslield; Mr. and Mrs. Henry A. Francis, Pittsfield; 
Master J. Dwight Francis, Mr. and Mrs. James Howard 
Kidd, Miss Carolyn P. Kidd, Master J. Howard Kidd, 
Jr., Tivoli-on-Hudson ; Mrs. Robert P. Bartlett, Roches- 
ter, N. Y., Captain Charles H. Manning, U. S. N. ; 
Mrs. Charles H. Manning, Manchester, N. H.; Mr. and 
Mrs. R. L. Manning. Mrs. H. L. Chapman, Mr. Charles 
Bartlett Manning, Mr. Harold Manning and Mr. Francis 
Manning, Manchester, N. H. ; Colonel Walter Cutting, 
Miss Juliana Cutting, Miss Madeline Cutting, Mrs. Henry 
W. Bishop, Miss Jessica P. Bishop, Pittslield. 

The statue is the work of Daniel Chester French. 
It represents William Francis Bartlett, dressed in the 
uniform of a Major General, with the cape overcoat, 
as saluting the flag, with a hat held in his right hand, 
the other resting upon the hilt of his sword. 

The height of the statue is seven feet and four inches 
above the plinth. It is of standard bronze, finished with 
a green patina, and was cast by the Bonney-Bonnard 
Company of New York. Behind the statue, on the 
plinth, are branches of laurel and olive, emblematic of 
18 



DEDICATION OF BARTLETT STATUE 

Fame and Peace. The statue itself rests upon a pedestal 
of Greek marble, known as Cippolino, and is of a green 
color, finely veined. It was designed by Henry Bacon 
of New York. The die of the pedestal is ornamented 
on two sides with a border of conventionalized laurel 
leaves of solid silver let into the stone. This border 
meets at the front a tablet, also of silver, bearing the 
following inscription: — 



WILLIAM FRANCIS BARTLETT 

A VOLUNTEER IN THE CIVIL WAR 

A MAJOR GENERAL AT THE AGE OF TWENTY-FOUR 

FOREMOST TO PLEAD FOR RECONCILIATION BETWEEN NORTH AND SOUTH 

BORN 1840 DIED I876 



At half past two o'clock the unveiling exercises 
began by buglers sounding "To the Colors," in saluta- 
tion. Immediately afterwards Lieutenant Governor Curtis 
Guild, Jr., Chairman of the Committee charged with the 
erection of the statue, advanced to the front of a small 
platform, all present standing with bared heads, and ad- 
dressing His Excellency Governor John L. Bates briefly 
narrated the history of the statue and formally presented 
it to the Chief Magistrate of the Conmionwealth. As 
the Lieutenant Governor pronounced his final words, the 

19 



DEDICATION OF BARTLETT STATUE 

cords releasing the American flags draped about the 
statue were drawn by Master James Dwight Francis, a 
seven-year-old grandson of General Bartlett, and at the 
same moment, from the balcony above, there burst forth 
from the band of the First Corps of Cadets " The Star 
Spangled Banner." As its strains died away, clear-toned 
bugles, sounding the major-general's call rang in salute. 

His Excellency the Governor then accepted the statue 
in behalf of the Commonwealth, and concluded by pay- 
ing high tribute to the splendid patriotism and beautiful 
character of General Bartlett. With the close of Gov- 
ernor Bates' address, the unveiling ceremonies in Memorial 
Hall ended. The company, under escort of Sergeant-at- 
Arms Remington, then passed up the grand staircase 
into the Hall of the Representatives, where the literary 
part of the dedicatory exercises were held. As presiding 
officer, Governor Bates took the chair, Brigadier General 
Morris Schaff, the orator of the day, sitting at his right, 
the Right Reverend William Lawrence, D.D., Bishop of 
the Episcopal Church of Massachusetts, occupying a chair 
at his left. The large chamber was crowded. 

Prayer was offered by the Right Reverend William 
Lawrence, D.D., a personal friend of General and Mrs. 
Bartlett. The First Corps Cadets Band rendered the " Pil- 
grim Chorus from Tannhauser " and immediately afterwards 
Brigadier General Morris Schaff delivered an oration 
upon the warrior and peacemaker. Upon the conclusion 
20 



DEDICATION OF BARTLETT STATUE 

of General Schaff's oration, a musical selection, "Songs 
of the Civil War," was given by the band, and follow- 
ing this Executive Secretary Edward F. Hamlin read trib- 
utes by officers who wore the gray in the Civil War, — 
Captain W. Gordon McCabe of Pegram's battery which 
was blown up in the explosion of the mine before 
Petersburg, and Captain John S. Wise, C. S. A., of 
Richmond, Virginia, both gentlemen having been intimate 
friends of General Bartlett. "America" was then sung, 
and benediction having been pronounced by Bishop Law- 
rence, the assemblage dispersed. 




21 



BIOGRAPHY 




BIOGRAPHY 

WILLIAM FRANCIS BARTLETT 
was born at Haverhill, Massachusetts, on 
the sixth of June, 1 840. He was the son 
of Charles L. Bartlett and Harriott (Plummer) Bartlett. 
Some of his ancestors served in the Revolutionary War, 
and one of his great grandfathers was present at the 
siege of Louisburg. 

On the seventeenth of April, 1861, while a junior 
at Harvard College, he joined the Fourth Battalion of 
Massachusetts Volunteer Militia, and was with the bat- 
talion from the twenty-fifth day of May until the twenty- 
fifth day of June on garrison duty at Fort Independence, 
in Boston Harbor. Upon the expiration of its tour of 
garrison duty the battalion was dismissed, and Bartlett 
returned to college. He was so delighted wath the 
month spent at the fort, however (which he declared to 
be "the pleasantest and most fruitful that I remember"), 
that thenceforth he gave much thought to military matters. 
Eagerness to enlist had so seized him that soon after 
he expressed the wish that the report were true that an 
order had come for ten more regiments. 

25 



DEDICATION OF BARTLETT STATUE 

In June, 1861, Colonel William Raymond Lee was 
authorized to raise the Twentieth Regiment of Massa- 
chusetts Volunteer Infantry, and to name his field and 
staff officers and the line officers of two companies. 
He offered the position of Lieutenant Colonel to Francis 
Winthrop Palfrey. While at Fort Independence, Bartlett 
had come under the command of Palfrey, and had so 
impressed him by the serious, faithful and intelligent 
manner in which he had striven to learn a soldier's 
duties, that through him he was tendered a captaincy in 
the new regiment. This commission he accepted, and 
after six weeks* trial of the soldierly capacity and effi- 
ciency of the line officers, he was named senior captain. 
On the fourth of September, 1861, the regiment left the 
State for the front. Seventeen days later. Captain Bart- 
lett experienced his first battle in the fierce struggle at 
Ball's Bluff, a struggle which cost the Twentieth regi- 
ment its colonel, major, adjutant, assistant surgeon, one first 
lieutenant taken prisoner, a captain and two lieutenants 
killed, and three captains and two lieutenants severely 
wounded, in addition to about one hundred and fifty 
non-commissioned officers and privates, killed, wounded 
and missing. Captain Bartlett, by reason of these casual- 
ties, thus became the second officer of the regiment pres- 
ent for duty. 

On the twenty-fourth of April, 1862, Captain Bartlett 
was with his regiment at the outposts in front of York- 
26 



DEDICATION OF BARTLETT STATUE 

town. While at the outer line, kneeling and examining 
the enemy through his field glass, a bullet from the rifle 
of a sharpshooter struck his left knee, shattering the 
bone down to the ankle, and necessitating the amputa- 
tion of the leg four inches above the knee. 

On September 20, 1862, he took command of Camp 
Briggs, Pittsfield, Massachusetts, where the Forty-ninth 
Regiment Massachusetts Infantry (a nine month's regi- 
ment) was assembling. The regiment had the right of 
choosing its officers, and at the election held on Novem- 
ber tenth. Captain Bartlett was unanimously chosen its 
colonel. 

The regiment sailed from New York on the twenty- 
fourth of January, 1863, and reached New Orleans on 
the seventh of February. It at once moved up the river 
to Carrolton, where General EJnory's division was en- 
camped. A few days later the regiment encamped at 
Baton Rouge, and on the fourteenth of March, the army 
of which Colonel Bartlett's regiment was a part began 
its march towards Port Hudson. On May twenty- 
seventh, the Nineteenth Corps, commanded by General 
Banks, was ordered to make an assault on the fortifica- 
tions of Port Hudson. The attack began on the left of 
the line, at about noon. General Augur's division (the 
centre) being ordered to assault the works in line of 
battle. Colonel Bartlett, commanding the Forty-ninth 
Massachusetts Volunteers, was in this division, and as, 

27 



DEDICATION OF BARTLETT STATUE 

by reason of the loss of his leg, he could not go on 
foot over a half mile of felled timber and abatis, he, 
being unwilling to let the regiment go without him, led 
it on horseback. The character of that leadership may 
be read between the lines of the following modest 
account in the GenereJ's own journal : 

" The edge of the woods was a few rods to the 
front, and then there was open ground to the works, 
except the obstructions. Soon the order Ccune to assault. 
I knew just what sort of a place there would be to go 
through — I had seen rebel fortifications before. I knew 
it would be almost impossible to get through the fallen 
trees, etc., even if 1 was not shot at. I knew, being 
the only officer mounted, I should be much more con- 
spicuous. I knew that my chances for life were very 
small. But I had to go horseback or not at all. So 
prayed that life and limb might be spared, and went in. 
^ ^ ^ ^^Q p^2^J g^^ two-thirds across the slaughter- 
field when, just as I was shouting to the men to keep 
closed on the color, pop I went off my horse like a 
rocket. * * ^ As for me, God had been very good. 
I was spared life, and most probably limb. The ball, a 
round one luckily, struck in the joint of my wrist, shatter- 
ing the bones. It was very painful. The other wound 
was slight. A buck-shot struck the outside of my right 
ankle and glanced down, entering the flesh and passing 
through the sole of my foot." 
28 



DEDICATION OF BARTLETT STATUE 

The ball was cut from the wrist, the wound dressed, 
and Bartlett was thence conveyed by steamboat to Baton 
Rouge. 

After the mustering out of the Forty-ninth regiment, 
Colonel Bartlett was authorized to raise the Fifty-seventh 
Regiment Massachusetts Infantry, which as Colonel he 
took to the front in April, 1864. After reaching An- 
napolis it became a part of the First Brigade, First 
Division, Ninth Army Corps. In the battle of the Wil- 
derness (May 6, 1864), Bartlett was again wounded, this 
time in the head, just above the right temple. Fortu- 
nately, the ball glanced off. In June, of the same year, he 
was commissioned Brigadier General of Volunteers, and a 
month later took command of the First Brigade of Led- 
lie's division, Ninth Army Corps, before Petersburg. In 
the assault of July thirtieth. General Bartlett, wdth most 
of his staff, was captured in the crater of the mine. He 
was held by the Confederates two months, and from dis- 
ease contracted because of hardships undergone during 
that period he never fully recovered. In June, 1865, he 
returned to active duty, taking command of the first 
division of the Ninth Corps, but on July fourteenth his 
division was broken up, and his actual service was over, 
although it was not until a year later that he was mus- 
tered out, a Major General by brevet, his commission be- 
ing dated back to March, 1 865, three months before his 
twenty-fifth birthday. 

29 



DEDICATION OF BARTLETT STATUE 

Before being mustered out, on October 14, 1865, 
General Bartlett was married to Miss Agnes Pomeroy, 
of Pittsfield, and most of the remaining years of his life 
were spent in Pittsfield and vicinity. In 1866 he was 
offered, but declined, the collectorship of the Port of 
Boston. In 1872 he accepted a position on the Gov- 
ernor's personal staff, but when, in 1 875, he was offered 
both the nomination for lieutenant governor on the Demo- 
cratic ticket, and the nomination for governor on the 
Republican ticket, he would take neither. 

His connection wdth the iron industry called him con- 
stantly to Virginia, sometimes for months at a time. 
While there he formed strong and enduring friendships 
with many of his late antagonists. He thus naturally 
became greatly interested in soothing sectional spirit and 
in restoring a common loyalty. His two most notable 
speeches pleading for reconciliation and a union in 
national feeling were made with singular felicity on June 
24, 1 874, at the dedication of Harvard's Memorial Hall 
to her volunteers, and on April 19, 1875, at the Cen- 
tennial of the battle of Lexington, commemorating the 
opening of a war whose second phase was the march- 
ing of southern soldiers to the relief of the siege of 
Boston. 

On December 1 7, 1 876, after suffering intensely during 
a long illness. General Bartlett died at his home in Pitts- 
field. His grave in the Pittsfield cemetery is marked 
30 



DEDICATION OF BARTLETT STATUE 

with a boulder of rough stone. It bears on a bronze 
shield, in addition to the conventional statement of death 
and rank, these simple words : — 

A Soldier undaunted by wounds and imprisonment. 
A Patriot foremost in pleading for reconciliation. 
A Christian strong in faith and charity. 
His life was an inspiration. 
His memory is a trust. 




31 



DEDICATION OF BARTLETT STATUE 



PROGRAMME 

THE UNVEIUNG OF THE STATUE IN THE HALL OF THE FLAGS 

AT 2.30 P.M. 

1 Bugle Call "To the Colors" 

2 Presentation of the statue to the 

Commonwealth by the lieutenant governor 

3 Unveiling of the Statue by master james dwight Francis 

4 Acceptance of the Statue by the governor 

THB AUDIENCE IS REQUESTED TO RISE WHEN, AT THE UNVEILING OF THE STATUE, THE 

BAND PLAYS " THE STAR SPANGLED BANNER," AND TO REMAIN STANDING UNTIL THE 

BUGLERS HAVE SOUNDED THE SALUTE TO THE MAJOR GENERAL 



EXERCISES IN THE HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES 
AT 3 P.M. 

HIS EXCELLENCY JOHN L. BATES, GOVERNOR OF MASSACHUSETTS 

IN THE CHAIR 

1 Prayer the right reverend william lawrence 

2 Music Pilgrim Chorus from Tannhauser BOSTON CADET BAND 

3 Oration brigadier general morris schaff 

4 Music Songs of the Civil War BOSTON CADET BAND 

5 Southern Tributes read by edward f. hamlin 

Executive Secretary 

6 "America" 

7 Benediction the right reverend william lawrence 

THE AUDIENCE IS REQUESTED TO JOIN IN SINGING THE FIRST AND LAST VERSES OF 

" AMERICA " 



33 



ADDRESS 

BY 

His Honor Curtis guild, jr. 

Lieutenant Governor of Massachusetts 




HIS HONOR CURTIS GUILD, Jr., LIEUTENANT GOVERNOR 




ADDRESS 

By His Honor Lieut. Governor Curtis Guild, Jr. 

OUR Excellency — Chapter Fifty-five of the 
resolves of Nineteen hundred and one pro- 
^^' vided an appropriation for a bronze statue 
of the soldier we honor to-day. Chapter four of the 
resolves of Nineteen hundred and three prescribed that 
the Governor and Council should determine the statue's 
site. In accordance with those resolves the modeling of 
this statue by Daniel Chester French was ordered. It 
has been placed here in the Hall of the Flags in eternal 
salute to the very colors which our Massachusetts Sydney 
in life so gloriously upheld. 

It is my high privilege as chairman of the State 
House Committee and as senior member of the Honor- 
able Council officially to report to you, sir, the completion 
of the work entrusted, under your excellency's super- 
vision, to our charge. It is further my happy duty now 
to deliver to you, sir, as chief of the Commonwealth, 
this statue, a memorial of one whose sheer, consummate 
heroism in war was as much a matter of course as his 
modesty and generosity in peace, a Massachusetts ideal 
incarnate of an American officer and gentleman — William 
Francis Bartlett. 

37 



ADDRESS 

BY 

HIS EXCELLENCY JOHN L. BATES 

Governor of Massachusetts 




HIS EXCELLENCY JOHN L. BATES, GOVERNOR 




ADDRESS 

By His Excellency Governor John L« Bates 

JR. Chairman — By the action of the Gen- 
eral Court it was decreed that Massachusetts 
should show her love for one of her de- 
parted soldiers by the erection of a statue to his memory. 

To the committee of the Council was entrusted the 
execution of the decree. The committee called to its 
aid the genius of one who, passing his boyhood near 
Concord Bridge, early gathered from the old batdefield 
an inspiration that has enabled him to well depict in 
marble, and in bronze, the spirit of patriotism. 

This statue, but now unveiled, conmiands our immediate 
admiration, for its every line tells of devotion to the flag. 
It is a worthy memorial of a deserving man, and on 
behalf of the Commonwealth, I accept it, sir, and thank 
you and the committee and all whose efforts have con- 
tributed to its erection. 

The people of this State have not been unmindful of 
the causes of their happiness, nor forgetful of their obli- 
gation to the men who have gone before them. 

From Plymouth Hill the uplifted finger of Faith, for- 

41 



DEDICATION OF BARTLETT STATUE 

ever pointing to the heavens, tells the secret of the 
cradling of the nation. 

Within the Hall of Representatives has been sus- 
pended for a century and a half the emblem of the 
codfish, typifying not, however, the sluggish denizen of 
the sea, but the sacrifice and courage of the early settlers 
who met wind and wave, braved the perils of the great 
ocean and brought forth from its depths the treasures 
upon which have been founded the fortunes that have 
contributed to the material welfare of the entire nation. 

On many an avenue and square we find the repre- 
sentation of some great soul who was a pioneer in 
thought or action, leading people into new and pleasanter 
conditions. In every city and village, temples devoted to 
education attest the importance which our people attach 
to knowledge, and to its attainment. 

But here in the centre of the busy metropolis, upon 
this hill, with the rushing tides of men dashing against 
its base, the State has reared its most costly monument 
and made of it a treasure house, not for silver or gold, 
or precious stones, or ancient archives, but for the flags 
for which men died — a memorial hall dedicated to the 
heroes who dared the storm of bursting shell and leaden 
hail, and with the musket and the sword drove treason 
from the land. 

And here, in this temple, by the flag to which he 
consecrated his life, in the presence of his comrades who 
42 



DEDICATION OF BARTLETT STATUE 

wore the blue, with the approval of his foes who wore 
the gray, and with the approval of all men who honor 
courage and loyalty, and with this occasion graced by 
the presence of the true woman, who, with his country, 
shared his heart, we dedicate this statue, to the brave 
memory of one who in early manhood, with liberal educa- 
tion, wdth loving friends, and every surrounding that tends 
to make life attractive, left all that he might light for his 
country; one who forgot the ties of business, of kindred, 
of love, when he heard that the flag had been lired 
upon; one whose zeal and skill in warfare brought him 
rapid promotion to high rank ; one who was in many 
battles and wounded in all save one; a man battle- 
riven and powder-scarred, always on the firing-line ; and 
yet, a man who, when peace came, was the first to urge 
generous treatment of the fallen foe — a man of beautiful 
character, faithful to every trust, a man whose memory 
Massachusetts will ever delight to honor — William Francis 
Bartlett. 




43 







PRAYER 


RT. 


REV. 


WILLIAM LAWRENCE. D.D. 




Bishop 


f the Episcopal Church of Massachusetts 




PRAYER 

By Right Reverend William Lawrence, DX>. 

LMIGHTY and everliving God, we yield 
unto Thee most high praise and hearty 
thanks for the wonderful grace and virtue 
declared in all Thy Saints ; especially do we praise 
Thee for the life of him whom we commemorate this 
day. 

We recall his modest bearing, his love of the truth, 
his courage and readiness to do battle, even against his 
brethren, for his country, freedom, and the right. 

We remember with gratitude the patient heroism v^th 
which he endured suffering, and the simple faith in His 
Savior, which was his inspiration in life and his strong- 
hold in the hour of death. 

Especially do we name here to-day the chivalrous 
heart that at the end of the war claimed those against 
whom he had fought as his brethren, and the firm voice 
and burning eloquence with which he called upon the 
people of the victorious North to join with their brethren 
of the South in building up a united country. 

" Blessed are the peacemakers for they shall be called 
the children of God." 

Pour Thy blessings, we pray Thee, upon the nation 

47 



DEDICATION OF BARTLETT STATUE 

for which he bled and died. Guide and support in 
their duties the President, the Governor of this State 
and all others in authority ; and so lead Thy people 
that peace and happiness, truth and justice, religion and 
piety may be established among us for all generations: 
through Jesus Christ, Our Lord, Amen. 




48 



ORATION 

BY 

BRIGADIER GENERAL MORRIS SCHAFF 




BRIGADIER GENERAL MORRIS SCHAFF, ORATOR 



ORATION 

By Brigadier General Morris Schaff 



H 



HE State is not a metaphor; it is a great 
fact: a spiritual body revolving around the 
divine nature of man. The State of Massa- 
chusetts has never doubted the capacity in men for 
great deeds. That is, and has been, her only religion of 
State; and in her devotions before the altar of her 
faith, in the vast cathedral of the soul, there has ever 
floated over that altar her ideals : her ideal commonwealth, 
her ideal citizen, and her ideal soldier. And to-day, in the 
high mood of her devotion, she enters her cathedral and 
marches up the aisle, as it were, carrying the embodi- 
ment of one of her ideals. 

Let us not underestimate the solemnity and significance 
of this ceremonial. Sharing the high mood of the State, 
we leave banks, wharves, the fields, the great manufacto- 
ries with their wheels humming homage to intellect 
devoted to labor, and we follow her up the aisle, hear- 
ing the voices of an invisible choir, the souls of inspired 
thinkers and doers, the notes of trumpets sounding back 
through the ages from far off graves of heroes, and the 

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voices of the ever peace-loving angels all calling on us 
to consecrate ourselves to the service of men and the 
true glory of the State. 

These services grow out of and bring back the great 
War of the Rebellion. In a moment of awful delirium, 
the sons of one of the most gallant of peoples were 
pushed to the front by slavery in her last bloody stand 
against freedom in this upward-moving world. When 
the sons of the South threw down their challenge, the 
sons of the equally gallant North stepped off from the 
consecrated steps of her temple of manhood and picked 
it up. In the overhanging sky of those four years of 
war all the evil spirits of the past gathered, and all the 
sweet-faced, encouraging spirits of the future, with the 
better cuigel of our government in their midst, and watched 
while the sons of North and South fought it out. 

A full sense of the inspired enthusiasm of those war 
days was not caught until, like huge dawn-tinted, bas- 
tioned clouds, they were drifting off toward the past's 
dim horizon line, with their heroic record. Then the 
State realized, for the first time in all its significance, 
that her manhood, the high virtue of courage, the citizen, 
the soldier and the gentleman, free government itself, had 
all been put to a mighty, final test, and that she and 
her sons had stood it, and stood it well. No wonder 
that, in the exultation of the hour, poets struck their 
highest notes, as in the "Commemoration Ode", and 
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DEDICATION OF BARTLETT STATUE 

that under the evoking wand of genius, monument after 
monument rose up over the land. 

Massachusetts, with quivering lip and with tears of 
glory on her cheek, called in the flags that her sons had 
home so well — flags whose every battle-dreaming strand 
is the string of a harp in her breast — and, after pon- 
dering the services of all, rose and put the name of 
Bartlett v^th those that glitter in her past; among the 
names which, like a diadem, band the brow of this 
chamber, filling it with calm, inspiring dignity, and 
through the silence of greatness with ever-exhorting speech. 
Let us follow him with her eye and her tumultuous 
beating heart as he mounts through the ordeal of war 
to the distinction of her most conspicuous soldier, the 
dew of youth still on his cheek, and, at last, to that 
higher distinction, the country's ideal of the soldier and 
gentleman. 

William Francis Bartlett was born in Haverhill, June 
6, 1 840. His mother's name was Harriott Plummer, and 
his father's, Charles L. Bartlett. His forefathers were in 
the colonial and the revolutionary wars. When the civil 
war broke out he was a junior in Harvard, and on 
the seventeenth of April, 1861, he left his class, a tall, 
spare, blue-eyed boy, and enlisted in the 4th battaKon, 
Massachusetts Volunteer Militia, entering that other great 
class that, after passing the awful ordeals of Stone River, 
Cold Harbor, Gettysburg, and the Wilderness, graduated 

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magna cum laude at Appomattox Court House in April, 
1865. 

General Bartlett's conduct under amis and the manly 
character he displayed attracted the attention of his 
officers, and when the 20th regiment was formed he 
was made its senior captain. The first action this gal- 
lant regiment was in, a regiment that met the enemy so 
valiantly on many a field, was at Ball's Bluff, Oct. 21, 
1861. Here the State gets her first clear view of Bart- 
lett. The troops have crossed the Potomac; they have 
climbed the steep, wooded bluffs; they are out in a 
small open field ; beyond, rise primeval woods through 
which the enemy are advancing. Bartlett's company 
was lying down. He says in a letter to his mother: 
"I couldn't bear to wake them (many were asleep) 
until the first volley was heard from the woods. I felt 
that if I were going to be hit, I should, whether I stood 
up or lay down, so I stood up among them to keep 
them more self-possessed." 

The enemy came on. They were met in the open 
field. " The ground," says Bartlett to his mother, " was 
smoking and covered with blood, while the noise was 
deafening." Mark the vividness of his description! Inch 
by inch our troops were driven back and down the 
bluffs. Bartlett called on his company for one last rally, 
and with Hallowell and Little Abbott, who fell glori- 
ously in the Wilderness, at his side, every man that 
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DEDICATION OF BARTLETT STATUE 



was left sprang forward, and at close range they met 
the on-rushing enemy. Bartlett and his brave men were 
swept back and down into the murderous fire that was 
being poured into the disorganized troops, left through 
awful blunders without any means of recrossing the river. 

It was a horrible scene; the river was full of strug- 
gling human beings; on the shore, men crowded help- 
lessly together among the wounded and the dying, and all 
under a withering fire. Bartlett collected what he could 
of the regiment, told those who could swim and wished 
to try, to take to the water. Then, standing by those 
who could not swim, he determined to get them out of 
that savage, plunging fire. He led them up the river, 
found an old water-logged skiff, and finally rescued all 
that were with him, he being the last to cross. The 
next night after the battle — the regiment having lost its 
colonel, major, and over 160 of its officers, non-commis- 
sioned officers and men, killed, wounded and missing — 
and he being senior in command, ordered a dress parade, 
"both to give the men", so he wrote to his mother, 
"the idea that everything was not broken up, and also 
to cheer the men with the music of the band." 

The death of General Baker, a senator of the United 
States, a boyhood and manhood friend of President 
Lincoln, who fell near Bartlett, while directing the battle, 
and whose imposing obsequies were held in the national 
capitol, made the disaster felt all over the North. The 

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only redeeming features were the courage of the troops, 
conspicuously the 20th, and Bartlett's heroic conduct. 
The papers glowed with their accounts, and the eyes of 
Massachusetts were fixed on him. In his journal he 
wrote: "They complimented me too highly, who did 
nothing more than my duty. My coolness was in me. 
I ought not to have the credit of it, but be grateful to 
God, who in His mercy had spared me, for granting me 
the courage and self-possession." 

Here, in this first battle, we get some measure of the 
man. Modest, brave, self-possessed, rising in the face 
of defeat and summoning music and soldierly ceremonial 
to lift the down-hearted up to their old heroic level — 
there was some of Massachusetts grit. We can see him 
standing in conmiand at the parade — the sun sinking 
down to rest in October's golden haze — tall, spare, his 
resolute, crystalline blue eyes on the regiment as the 
band marched by. Oh, 20th Massachusetts, how many 
fields of glory lay before you! 

The following April, while on the skirmish line at 
Yorktown, he was wounded and his left leg was ampu- 
tated four inches above the knee. On his recovery he 
was made colonel of the 49th, a Berkshire regiment, and 
forty-one years ago to-day, on account of his wound, 
having to go that way or not at all, he led it mounted 
at the assault of Port Hudson. Men! Veterans of the 
49th! as your eyes fell on your old colors and the veil 
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fell from your old commander's face, how vividly must 
have come back the scenes of that bitter action! You 
see the lines forming, you see regiment after regiment 
falling in; you see that iron-hearted, forlorn hope at the 
front, and many of your regiment are in it, standing 
there waiting for the word to carry their fascines forward 
to fill the ditch. 

The word comes. You see all that column of 3000 
men moving with unfurled colors, shells bursting in your 
faces and tearing through your Knes, men falling at 
every step, the flag, your flag, borne on and your 
colonel, the only mounted oflicer in the column, the 
gallant Mifflin at his side. You hear again his trumpet 
voice calling you, amid that deadly fire, to close on the 
colors ; you see him fall. The assault fciils ; and the 
ground clear up to the works is strewn with the dead. 

To show the spirit Bartlett infused into his men, when 
volunteers for a second forlorn hope were called for, 
every man that was left of this Berkshire regiment 
stepped out. Oh, beautiful blooms the laurel on the 
brow of Berkshire's hills, but when those men stepped 
out for that forlorn hope, the laurel of fame bloomed on 
the brow of every one. 

Bartlett was wounded in the right foot; his left wrist 
shattered, nearly losing his hand. " Who was that man 
on horseback?" asked Confederate officers of Colonel 
Cutting, General Bartlett's brother-in-law, while under a 

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flag of truce to bury the dead. When he told them they 
said: "He was a gallant fellow and we thought him 
too brave a man to be killed, and ordered our men not 
to fire at him." They did not know that they were 
sparing the life of one of the best friends the South 
was ever to have; who would lead Blue and Gray up, 
not to breastworks of war, but to the bright, sweet fields 
of peace, whence both can see the star of their country 
ploughing its way up through empires and kingdoms to 
the lone zenith of its destiny. 

Scholarship, our whole system of education, only 
reach perfection and become overpowering, simple reali- 
ties when truth and beauty stand fully revealed to us. 
We cannot reason about the mystic significance of either 
of them, but we know that both are elementary in 
human nature; the quality of seeing and appreciating 
them is called the aesthetic. There is an entry in Bart- 
lett's Port Hudson diary that throws light on the aes- 
thetic quality of his nature : 

" Saturday, March 1 4 — Got the order at midnight 
to start at 3 A.M. It made a wild picture in the 
dark morning, the camp fires blazing high, surrounded 
by dark forms. A little piece of the old moon rising 
in the east." 

How that night scene fixes itself on the mind — the 
bit of old moon in the silent east! Along with the 
power to brave and to do, he had the power to see 
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DEDICATION OF BARTLETT STATUE 

and to feel, and when he made that entry he was satis- 
fying, unconsciously, the most exacting requirement of 
the ideal; for the ideal is nothing but the poetic emblem 
of the real, and the underlying element in human nature 
that at last makes the emblem is poetry bursting into 
deeds. 

Before we leave Port Hudson there is a single line 
in a letter to Governor Andrew about the appointment 
of a chaplain : " I have also read the services myself on 
Sunday to all who desired to attend," writes General 
Bartlett. I cannot conceive of any human achievement 
or character that is not magnified and made finer by the 
ennobling sentiment of religion. And, at this point, let 
me quote what Mr. Justice Holmes said, who for the 
sake of all that this occasion calls for, by common consent, 
should have made this address : " I knew him, and may 
even say that I knew him well; yet until that book 
appeared (his life by General Frank Palfrey) I had not 
known the governing motive of his soul. I had admired 
him as a hero. When I read I learned to revere him 
as a saint. His strength was not in honor alone, but in 
religion, and those who do not share his creed must see 
that it was on the wings of religious faith that he 
mounted above even valiant deeds into an empyrean of 
ideal life." 

I cannot conceive of an ideal soldier and gentleman 
without the reverence and the deep, secretly beautiful 

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trust in God, and our ceremonial to-day will be incom- 
plete, shallow, and mere froth if we do not get clearer 
visions of the best and are not moved by the inspiring 
influences of that spiritual world that overarches life. 

Bartlett, after recovering from his Port Hudson wounds, 
was made colonel of the 57th. When Governor Andrew 
presented the colors, he said : " I commit these banners 
to you as an officer, as a citizen of Massachusetts, and 
as a personal friend, — an officer firm and loyal, a citizen 
faithful and patriotic, a friend in whom there is no guile. 
I know that neither on the white stripes of the one 
flag nor on the white field of the other will there ever fall 
the slightest dishonor." 

Bartlett turned to his men : " Can I say to him for you 
that you will do honor to this trust, that you will carry 
it, and defend it, pray for it, and if need be, die for 
it?" Survivors of the 57th! you who followed him into 
the Wilderness with those banners, would that I could 
with the wave of a magic hand lift the Wilderness 
before this audience and let it catch through the smoke 
and tangled undergrowth a view of those lines of battle ; 
hear them pouring into each other those crashing volleys, 
as you saw it and as I saw it on that sixth of May 
morning, 1864. See you the 57th charging over a 
regiment that would not move, and hear Hancock, under 
whose eyes you charged, exclaim, " Glorious ! " as, with 
Bartlett leading, you carried the line forward. He says 

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in his diary : " The loss in my regiment is great, nearly 
200 killed and wounded (the actual loss was 251). I 
am satisfied with their conduct." 1 think the rising night 
wind never reaches the tree tops where you charged 
that it does not breathe a note which is taken up 
throughout the timber of the Wilderness and becomes a 
mighty requiem for all, for Blue and Gray. 

Officers, sergeants, corporals, and privates of the 49th 
and 57th! you who matched bravery by like bravery! 
it is by your valor his monument rises. And oh, officers 
of the army and navy, companions of the Loyal Legion, 
and soldiers of all commands, dream not for one moment, 
I pray you, that you and your services are lost sight of 
in this ceremonial. You carried into the field the same 
high sense of duty as Bartlett; he was no more ready 
to die for a principle than you were; and your services 
are just as much a part of that glowing past as his. If 
the clouds of the war are drifting off dawn-tinted, the 
tint is but the blood that did not leave your cheeks 
when you fronted the guns of Fredericksburg, charged 
with Buford's cavalry, or met Pickett's matchless charge 
at Gettysburg, and if Bartlett could step off that monu- 
ment, he would decline all distinction and modestly take 
his place among you. But I know you would put him 
back, proud that he represented truly your youth, your 
courage, and your patriotism. 

General Bartlett was shot in the right temple and lay 

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off with the wounded in the Wilderness till night, and 
was then carried to Fredericksburg. When he recovered 
he was made a brigadier-general; he was but 24 years 
old. He rejoined the old Army of the Potomac just 
in time to lead his brigade at the explosion of the mine 
in front of Petersburg. How our hearts beat as we 
saw those troops going up that deadly slope, one line 
of blue after another, the colors streaming out, trembling 
as they start to fall, only to be picked up and carried 
on, the field behind them blue, dotted as one of our 
Berkshire fields when the fringed gentian is blooming! 

" I got up to the enemy's works about as soon as 
any one," Bartlett says in his diary. "Got into the 
crater. Took the first and second line of the enemy. 
Held them until after one, when we were driven back 
by repeated charges. I fought them for an hour (gallant 
Amory who is v^th us to-day was with him) after 
they held the whole line, excepting the crater where 
we were, their flags within some feet of ours across 
the works. A shell knocked down a boulder of 
clay on to my wooden leg and crushed it to pieces, kill- 
ing the man next to me. I surrendered to General 
Mahone." 

He was in the hands of the enemy, suffering with 

disease until late in the autumn, when he was exchanged, 

a physical wreck. Here, practically, ended his military 

career, for before he was able to take the field again 

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DEDICATION OF BARTLETT STATUE 



the confederacy fell, and he was mustered out, a brevet 
major-general at 25, the most conspicuous soldier that 
Massachusetts sent to the war. 

If we seek for the explanation of this proud distinc- 
tion, notwithstanding the dazzling brightness of the ser- 
vices of his youthful contemporaries, we shall find it, not in 
the admiration of personal friends or the discrimination of 
the educated class only, but in the magic that unconscious, 
spontaneous greatness has over the heart of the common 
people. Thousands of the people of Massachusetts had 
never seen him, yet they had seen his courage and 
high spirit carrying his frail body back again and agam 
from the surgeon s table and the hospital to face once 
more the enemy. They had pictured him leading the 
handhil of brave men up Ball's Bluff to make the last 
rally; they had pictured him at the foot of the Bluff 
leading them out of that withering, plunging fire ; they 
had pictured him, mounted, leading the assault; they saw 
him coming up the streets of Pittsfield, bringing home the 
49th, with his wounded arm in a box sling and his 
crutch strapped on behind him; they saw him in the 
Wildemess and at the Crater ; and once the blaze of the 
popular hero is lighted in the minds of the multitude 
it never goes out. Moreover, he was young and a 
gentleman; and whatever may have been the soldier 
ideals of the common people theretofore, when Sidney 
and Bayard fell, they caught the gleam of the gentleman, 



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and their ideal soldier henceforth could only be, under 
the light of progressive insight, brave, young, and a 
scholar, he must have the sterling ring, and, thrown over 
all and infusing all, the mild transparence of the gentle- 
man. Bartlett filled their ideal. Fame loves the poet, 
the musician and the artist, but her sweetheart is youth, 
the youth whose heart is overlaid with the iron virtue 
of courage. 

On the fourteenth of October, 1865, General Bart- 
lett was married to Mary Agnes Pomeroy of Pittslield, 
who graces this occasion with her stately presence. He 
settled among us and identified himself at once with 
every uplifting agency. And although there was borne 
into our mountain valley the echoes of the hailing of the 
popular hero, it made no difference with him ; he bore 
himself quietly, with unpremeditated dignity and uncon- 
scious good manners. 

Meanwhile, the era of reconstruction had begun its 
visionary, unreasonable, and dishonored career. Blinded 
as the North was by its violent yet natural rage over 
the assassination of Lincoln, and violating the most funda- 
mental principles of political wisdom by disfranchising 
the intelligent and distrusting the honesty of purpose of 
the national leaders, its scheme for the reconstruction of 
the South was doomed to failure from the first. The 
politicians, taking advantage of the revulsion, began their 
torturing process, knowing that the more violence the 
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DEDICATION OF BARTLETT STATUE 

South was driven to under it, the surer was their grasp 
on political power. 

In the meantime, Bartlett had gone into the iron busi- 
ness, which, in the course of its management, carried him 
once more down into Virginia. He saw his old antago- 
nists contending almost hopelessly with a state of affairs 
such as no high-spirited people ever went through and 
endured. Touched by the appeal of the men who, like 
himself, had faced death bravely for what they believed 
was right, he came home sorrowful, feeling that instead 
of the North and the South becoming reconciled, the 
seed was being sown for hereditary hatred and possible 
future rebellion. The North, he felt, was being dragged 
away from the high plane of its manhood ; with his 
usual courage, he pushed aside all political honors and 
decided to appeal to the understanding and patriotism of 
the North. 

The opportunity to make his appeal came with the 
dedication of Memorial Hall, June 24, 1874, erected 
to commemorate the services in the war of the sons 
of Harvard. He could not have had a better place. 
Harvard — wrapped up in the very name is all the 
history and every high aspiration of our country — Har- 
vard, in the splendor of her past and in the greater 
splendor of high purpose, was paying her tribute to her 
high-spirited sons who had gone out into the field and 
given up life gallantly for what she had taught them 

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DEDICATION OF BARTLETT STATUE 

was sacred — a free, an enlightened, and a righteous 
republic. His biographer says : " When Bartlett arose, 
and the first words uttered by his deep and manly voice 
were heard, and the audience became aware that they 
came from the shattered soldier, whose tall form and 
wasted face they had seen at the head of the procession 
as he painfully marshalled it, a great silence fell on the 
multitude." 

Bartlett said : " The day is not without sadness as 
we read the beloved names on those marble tablets; 
and yet, not without gladness as we reflect whatever 
change of fortune may come to us as the years roll on, 
their fame is secure, immutable, immortal. We shall 
grow old and wear out, but they will always keep for 
us their glorious, spotless youth. I firmly believe that 
when the gallant men of Lee's army surrendered at 
Appomattox (touched by the delicate generosity of Grant, 
who, obeying the dictates of his own honest heart, 
showed no less magnanimity than political sagacity) they 
followed the example of their heroic chief, and, with 
their arms, laid down forever their disloyalty to the 
Union. Take care, then, lest you repel by injustice or 
suspicion, or even by indifference, the returning love of 
men who now speak with pride of that flag as ' our 
flag.' Our brothers fell, not that New England might 
prosper, nor that the West might thrive — they died for 
their country, for the South, no less than for the North. 
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And the southern youth, in the days to come, will see 
this, and as he stands in these hallowed halls and reads 
those names, realizing the grandeur and power of a 
country which, thanks to them, is still his, will exclaim, 
' These men fought for my salvation as well as for their 
own. They died to preserve not merely the unity of 
a nation, but the destinies of a continent.*'* 

In March, the following year, Bartlett was asked to 
make a speech at the centennial celebration of Lexing- 
ton. He was failing, and failing fast. Death had set 
out and was coming on rapidly, when lo ! the angel of 
peace hurried from the gate of heaven and, overtaking 
death, looked into his grim, meditative face and implored 
him to halt till her knightly young soldier could make 
his final plea for reconciliation between the brothers of 
his brave generation ; and death halted. 

Bartlett says in his diary: "A few words have come 
to me which I feel may, perhaps, fall on good ground 
and bring forth the fruit of peace emd reconciliation. 
For why celebrate the centennial of the birth of a 
nation if that nation is still to be divided and distracted 
by sectional hostility? It is treading on delicate ground, 
but I know I am sincere, and I believe that what I am 
to say is for the good of the whole country, and if I 
can carry people with me v*dll do much good." 

General Grcmt was there and a vast concourse to cele- 
brate the one hundredth armiversary. Chilled through and 

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faint, Bartlett rose and said: "The distinguished soldier 
who is your guest to-day never czune nearer the heart 
of the people than when he scud, *Let us have peace/ 
Look to your heroes — their leaders, their Gordons, their 
Lees, their Johnsons, Lamar and Ripley — and tell me 
if you find in their utterances anything but renewed 
loyalty and devotion to a reunited country. As I begged 
you last summer, I entreat you again; do not repel the 
returning love of those men by suspicion and indifference. 
These are the men, as our great and good Governor 
Andrew told us at the close of the war, these are the 
men by whom and through whom you must restore the 
South." (A short while before the flag of Shaw's regi- 
ment had been returned by General Ripley of South 
Carolina.) Bartlett went on to say : " There are tattered 
flags in that sacred hall in yonder capitol, around which, 
in the shock of battle, I have seen dear friends and 
brave men fall like autumn leaves. There are flags there 
that I cannot look upon without tears of pride and sor- 
row. But there is no flag there which has to-day for 
us a deeper significance or that bears within its folds a 
brighter omen of 'Peace on earth, good will to men* 
than that battle-stained emblem so tenderly restored by 
a son of South Carolina, whom here, in the name of 
the soldiers of Massachusetts, I thank and greet as a 
brother. And I am proud that he was an American 
soldier. As an American I am as proud of the men 
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DEDICATION OF BARTLETT STATUE 

who charged so bravely with Pickett's division on our 
lines at Gettysburg as I am of the men who so bravely 
met and repulsed them there. Men cannot always 
choose the right cause; but when, having chosen that 
which conscience dictates, they are ready to die for it, 
if they justify not their cause, they at least ennoble 
themselves. Oh, sir, as Massachusetts was first in war, 
so let her be first in peace." 

It would be impossible for me to give the immediate 
effect of this speech on the South; but if the shot at 
Sumter struck the iron in the blood of the North, this 
knightly utterance struck the heart of the naturally im- 
pulsive and naturally chivalric South. The old fires 
burned down and out; the fruits of Appomattox became 
affection and loyalty; the prophetic light of a reunited 
country that shone in Lincoln's benignant eyes was re- 
alized. 

When we ponder on the results that followed complete 
reconciliation in all their national and humanizing signifi- 
cance, an almost overwhelming sense of glory breaks 
over the mind. We are caught up by a whirlwind of 
exultation, as it were, and we sweep along with our 
country in its flight. But let us not be carried away 
from the more enduring glory of our ideals, for long after 
the star of our country has been quenched in oblivion 
they vAW still be glowing in the human heart. 

Bartlett's brilliant career culminated in his efforts in 

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behalf of reconciliation. We have tried as well as we 
could in following it to get a clearer perception of 
the evenlasring and inspiring qualities that make his life 
fulfill the ideals as we see them. We have been lighted 
on our way by the glow of his own deeds, and there 
has shone above us also the lamps of poetry, of re- 
ligion, and a reverence for the divine things that man 
is capable of. His life ended on Sunday, the seven- 
teenth of December, 1876, eight days before Christmas, 
just in time for his upward mounting spirit — met more 
than half way by that of Stonewall Jackson and Sedg- 
wick, Albert Sidney Johnston and Shaw, and a great 
flight of knights of all ages, the redeemed spirits of Dick 
Steele and Colonel Newcome in their midst — just in time 
for him and his heaven-sent escort to catch the notes 
of a Christmas-rehearsing choir that once sang under 
the stars on a hillside of this world, "Peace on earth 
and good will toward men." — His valiant clay is lying 
up among the beautiful hills of Berkshire. 

It was a great achievement to overcome the rebellion; 
it was a vastly greater achievement, one that history will 
not forget, for the battle-scarred generation that wore the 
blue and the gray to be on terms of mutual respect and 
friendship before leaving the stage. In this achievement 
let us not overlook the South, who, in a situation not 
then appreciated, and now only half appreciated, by the 
North, rose to the challenge of greatness. If there be 

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garlands for generations, and ours wears one, we owe it 
to Grant and to Bartlett more than to any others ; for, 
having won victory, they wooed peace back to the land. 
By that act the standard of the conduct of nations has 
been raised; the standard of the gentleman has become 
the law of power; and victory to be glorious must 
henceforth be magnanimous, for valor dwells with mercy. 

I believe the divine mission of our country is to 
furnish the world with ideals, ideal soldiers, ideal edu- 
cated citizens, and ideal gentlemen. And it is in that 
class that we must look for the ideal soldier type. We 
shall not find him dying for Imperialism; we shall not 
find him in a war that is waged for commercial suprem- 
acy; we shall not find him in a war that is waged for 
military glory. He may fall a gentleman in any war, 
but for Massachusetts ideals he must fall a soldier and 
a gentleman in a righteous cause. Then not only Mas- 
sachusetts, but poetry, literature, and religion itself will 
claim him. Government has its dreams as well as the 
young mother over the child's cradle. It dreams of the 
crests of honor, courage, wisdom, and the service of 
men. 

In these days, when wealth is lifting her temple to 
mammon and the barbaric spirit of military glory is 
luring the nation, I believe it is our duty to head the 
other way; back to the simple, the modest, the lofty- 
minded company, those who bring the inspiration and 

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enduring glory of a courageous peace, back to the state 
religion of Massachusetts. 

In this faith, under the banner of duty, marching to 
the music of the high aspirations of the heart, we come 
to-day with our hero, Bartlett, and with the colors that 
were carried in the war for freedom ; proudly and 
tenderly we leave him for the emulation of those who 
come after us. And I think I hear an anthem from 
a dome that is higher than this, " Blessed are the peace- 
makers, for they shall be called the children of God." 




72 



Richmond, Virginia, May 18. 1904 

EDWARD F. HAMLIN, Esq., 

Executive Secretary, 
Council Chamber, Commonwealth of Massachusetts, Boston, Mass. 

Dear Sir: — I beg leave to acknowledge the invitation extended 
to me to be present on the 2 7th inst., " Port Hudson Day," at 
the State House, in Boston, on the occasion of the dedication of 
a statue to the late General William Francis Bartlett. 

To my great disappointment, I find that it is not possible for 
me to give myself this mournful pleasure, owing to imperative en- 
gagements here, so, craving your pardon for my delay, I beg 
that you will convey to His Elxcellency the Governor and to the 
Honorable Council my grateful acknowledgments for their kind 
invitation, coupled with my sincere regrets that I sun unable to 
join with them in thus publicly honoring the memory of this illus- 
trious son of Massachusetts. 

Through the "fortunes of war" it fell to me, as a Confed- 
erate soldier, to oppose General Bartlett on more them one desperate 
field during the eventful years from 1861 to 1865. Through my 
own good fortime, it came to me to know him well personally 
after we had sheathed our swords on the conclusion of that mo- 
mentous struggle. He came to us here in Richmond during the 
dreadful days of *' reconstruction." He came to us as a brillicuit 
soldier of high courage and dauntless resolution, to which we 
could all bear witness, and naturally that of itself drew to him at 
the very outset the kindly feeling of brave men. 

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DEDICATION OF BARTLETT STATUE 

Then, when his old adversaries came to meet him personally 
and marked the gallant bearing, the gracious courtesy, the sweet 
dignity, kindliness and simplicity of the high bred gentlemcin, and 
fell imder the witchery of his engaging personality, his deep, res- 
onant voice, the frank gaze of his fearless eyes, the charm of his 
sunny smile — as if by touch of a magician's wand every barrier 
melted away and we took him to our hearts with all the warmth 
of affection and sincerity that we would have given a dear com- 
rade of our ovm side. 

I shall never forget how profoundly moved and touched he 
was by the unexpected greeting that was given him on his return 
from Lexington, Massachusetts, in April, 1875, when on the one 
hundredth anniversary of the birth of the nation he made his 
famous plea for genuine reconciliation between the North cuid the 
South. 

The telegraph had flashed far southward his generous and 
patriotic uttereinces, and all southern hearts were touched. 

He was the first northern man who had the courage and 
magnainimity and broad patriotism to stand up in the North, where 
an ignoble gospel of doubt and suspicion and vindictiveness was 
being preached from pulpit zuid rostrum cind boldly proclciim his 
convictions that the plighted word of brave men of his own blood 
should be fully trusted by the nation. 

He was the first, the very first, we old soldiers love to re- 
member, to pour out a brave man's scorn on the " cheap patriots " 
of the hour, who, insolent by reason of victory won by others, 
were proving themselves in halls of legislation, in pulpit, cind on 
the hustings as "invincible in peace as they had been in war." 

In his modesty Bartlett never dreamed that there would be 
any public demonstration at his home coming. I don't think any 
one did. It was in the air that " General Bartlett was coming 
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DEDICATION OF BARTLETT STATUE 



home" (for we had quite appropriated him by that time, and 
"home" meant Virginia). That was all. "The boys in gray" 
did the rest. 

No one knows to this day how the demonstration was started, 
or who started it. Perhaps it was a suggestion of Bradley John- 
son's, one of "Stonewall" Jackson's hardest lighters, a man of 
distinguished Revolutionary ancestry and a general officer of high 
daring and generous impulses. It was just one of those spon- 
taneous affairs that no amount of official preparation can ever 
compass and no human power can ever stop, when once started. 

As his train rolled into the station on that April night, there 
stood drawn up the remnant of one of Lee's veteran regiments, — 
"The First Virginian Infantry" — the surviving officers and men, 
and beyond a vast array of citizens. The bronzed and bearded 
veterans at once seized the astonished Bartlett, calling out glee- 
fully, "We've got you again. General!" bore him shoulder high 
to his carriage, took out the horses and dragged the carriage to 
his residence, their band playing " welcome," while they all cheered 
like mad. 

As Bartlett alighted and was escorted to the porch in front 
of his house, there fell a sudden hush, and General Johnson, who 
was an orator of magnetic power, spoke a few eloquent words 
of welcome, assuring him of the appreciation of his old adver- 
saries touching his patriotic plea at Lexington. " And now men," 
cried Johnson in his clear, ringing voice, "General Bartlett has 
often heard the ' Rebel yell ' in anger, — show him how it sounds 
in friendship." No one can describe the scene. As the heavens 
were rent by that shrill, wild yell, that rose and swelled in 
mighty volume and soared still higher, the northern hero who had 
not blenched at Ball's Bluff or Port Hudson, on the lines in front 
of Yorktown, or in front of Petersburg, stood completely unmanned, 

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DEDICATION OF BARTLETT STATUE 

the tears streaming down his thin, bronzed cheeks, while still that 
glorious yell rose and soared yet higher £ind higher, and even 
higher, in wild crescendo, until its piercing note seemed to smite 
and shiver the very skies. Bartlett caught the inspiration of the 
difference in the note of that yell, since last he had heard it amid 
the dust and sweat of battle, detecting in it now the glad presage 
of what had been the paramount eind passionate aspiration of his 
generous heart since the day he had sheathed his stainless sword 
— the genuine reconciliation of brave and patriotic men, who had 
fought out their contention in valiant fashion cuid who had become 
once more reunited "in spirit and in truth," 

Kindled by the inspiration, and pulling himself together with a 
mighty effort, he stepped forward in the light of the torches and 
made a speech, the thrilling eloquence of which will long remain 
a great tradition in Richmond — ending with these memorable 
words: "The war has left us soldiers, once foes, now friends, a 
memory of hard-fought fields, of fearful sacrifices, of heroic valor, 
and has taught us a lesson to be transmitted to our children — 
that divided, we were terrible — united, we are forever invincible." 

There were many other eyes than Bartlett's wet with tears 
that night, and it is an open secret that had he continued his 
residence here, it was the fixed purpose of his old adversaries to 
urge his name for the governorship of the "Old Dominion." 

Nor did there ever fade from his mind the recollection of 
that day disastrous to the Federal cause at Port Hudson — the 
anniversary of which Massachusetts has fitly selected as peculiarly 
appropriate for the dedication of this statue, — when riding in at 
the head of his men — he the only mounted officer in the assault- 
ing column, he distinctly heard the Confederate officer commEinding 
in his immediate front, touched with generous admiration of his 
foeman's reckless daring, call out imperiously to his men: "For 
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DEDICATION OF BARTLETT STATUE 

God's sake, men, don't shoot as brave a chap as that," and so, 
for a time, the Puritan-Caveilier rode unharmed into that hell of 
fire. 

Massachusetts does well to preserve in imperishable bronze 
the form and lineaments of this Puritan-Cavalier, for in the long 
roll of those v^ho have made her " glorious by the pen " and 
"famous by the sw^ord," there shines out no name that quicker 
stirs the pulse's play, no name worthier the reverence and emula- 
tion of her children than that of William Francis Bartlett. In the 
contemplation of an heroic life, which, tried by both extremes of 
fortune, was found equal to the trial, and rounded at the last 
with the sleep which he giveth his beloved, selfish sorrow dares 
not raise its wail. 

We, who still miss him and hold him in our hearts as a 
"dear comrade of the other side," can simply say, as his favorite 
Milton says of Sampson: 

"Nothing is here for tears, nothing to wail, 
* * * * nothing but well and fair. 
And what may quiet us in a death so noble." 

Your obedient servant, 

W. GORDON McCABE, 

Formerly Captain PegranCs Battalion 
Artillery, Ji. T. Hill's Corps, 
tArmy of Uiprth Virginia. 



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DEDICATION OF BARTLETT STATUE 



New York, May 10, 1904 
MR. EDWARD F. HAMUN. 

Executive Secretary, 

Boston, Mass. 

Dear Sir: — This morning's mail brought your letter of the 
9th inst., inviting me to be present at the State House in Boston, 
May 27th, when the statue to General William F. Bartlett is 
dedicated. I regret most sincerely that my engagements will pre- 
vent my going to Boston, for no one would feel more keenly the 
privilege of doing honor to General Bartlett's memory. 

Indeed the Southern people did feel a sincere friendship for 
this worthy son of Massachusetts. 

We first knew him as a dauntless soldier, with the courage 
of his convictions, which placed him, without a tremor, in des- 
perate situations, from which he emerged undismayed. As our 
captive, he won our hearts ; as one of our conquerors, he retained 
our affections. Time made him our fellow-citizen, our co-worker 
in the callings of peace, our neighbor, and our friend. I knew 
him in cill the rapidly changing phases of those kcdeidoscopic days. 
I remember him when he was almost vomited forth from the sul- 
phurous vortex of the crater at Petersburg into the Confederate 
lines, a soldier with a wooden leg leading a forlorn hope. After- 
wards I knew him, when with his sweet faunily, in the peaceful 
days that followed the war, we occupied neighboring pews in 
St. Paul's Church at Richmond. I had meoiy chcinces to observe 
him, in his defeats, in his triumphs, in the calm of peace and 
privacy. 

At all times, in all places, under all circumstances, GenereJ 

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DEDICATION OF BARTLETT STATUE 

Bartlett was above all other things a Christian and a gentleman. 
How few of us there are, alas, who can, under all conditions, 
keep these traits plaunly visible to all who see us. Yet such he 
was, — type of that old-time manhood which immortalizes the best 
men of Massachusetts and Virginia — courage, love, tenderness, 
charity, modesty, humility, are the inevitable concomitants of the 
basic traits of Christian faith and the life of a gentleman. They were 
his as naturcJly as the breath he breathed. His face bore their 
impress, his manner and voice bespoke them, and he stole into the 
affections of his new made friends as naturally as if he had been 
with them and of them all his life. For strong and bold as he 
had been in the great struggle, he realized that it was over for- 
ever — that they had his own traits, by the valor and self-sacrifice 
they had shown — cuid that the hope of the future lay in mutual 
forgiveness and forgetfulness, and in the union of the best of both 
sides for the atteiinment of peace aoid a common glory. 

Well may Massachusetts cherish the memory of such sons. 
Illustrious as is her roU-call, she never bred a truer soldier or a 
truer gentleman than Bartlett. Thank God that Virginia for a 
time enjoyed the privilege of witnessing his unsurpassed courage, 
and afterwards clciiming him as her adopted son. 

With great respect, I am 

Yours truly, 

JNO. S. WISE. 



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